Insurance is a critical component for financial security

Adequate insurance planning is an important – yet often overlooked – component of a financial plan. Through our MASTERPLAN^® approach, your personal team of Hefren-Tillotson financial advisors will collaborate with our in-house insurance advisors to integrate insurance planning into the overall development of your wealth management plan.

After a detailed analysis of your financial situation, we’ll determine whether your current coverage is adequate for your lifestyle, needs and future plans, and make recommendations to seamlessly include your policies. Only then can you provide the best financial support for surviving family members.

We also offer disability insurance that surpasses traditional employer-offered plans.

For more information, click here for insurance articles and tips featured on our blog, In the Details.

Business transition planning with a personal touch

If you own an independently operated or closely-held business, your business may very likely be the largest asset in your wealth portfolio. With decades of experience working with business owners, we can work with you, one-on-one, to implement the financial management strategies you need to protect your company’s standing and maximize its worth.

We can guide you through the business succession strategies that will protect the next generation of your business through “keyman” protection, buy-sell agreements and disability buyouts—assuring you the smoothest possible management transition.

Small Business Retirement Plans

To attract and retain the best employees and comply with increasingly complex regulations, we can help you select and implement:

• Pensions
• Profit-sharing
• 401(k) plans
• Deferred compensation
• Supplemental retirement plans and more

Strategies for charitable giving

Charitable giving is an important core value for many investors. The right approach can help you maximize your ability to contribute generously.

Hefren-Tillotson has the expertise to help you implement charitable giving strategies in your wealth management plan. By applying the MASTERPLAN^® approach to your investment management plan, we can address your ambitions for philanthropic giving either before or after retirement.

Our in-house expertise will help ensure that your contributions are executed in a manner that benefits both your favorite causes and your portfolio.

Financial planning for long-term care

Now more than ever, the challenge of planning for long-term care, either for your aging parents or for yourself, is very real. For many investors, it’s a priority.

At Hefren-Tillotson, we can help you adequately plan for these long-term care and nursing home costs with long-term care insurance from some of the oldest, most respected companies in the industry.

Yes, it is possible to achieve meaningful savings for long-term care without draining your savings and retirement accounts—and we will gladly show you how.

Education funding and beyond

If you’re like many investors, you’ll send your children off to college long before you retire. Wondering how to afford rising tuition costs has become a rite of passage for today’s parents.

We can’t bring down the cost of college, but we can offer you a solid college savings plan. It all begins with making intelligent choices about the investment vehicles that can help ease the costs as your child approaches and enters college.

Leveraging our MASTERPLAN^® approach and using tools like the Coverdell Education Savings Account and 529 Plan, we can build an education funding strategy that achieves your goals, maximizes tax relief and works seamlessly with other aspects of your financial plan to help you achieve a higher level of confidence in your higher education plan.

If you are facing divorce, we know this is quite likely one of the most stressful times of your life.

Individual assets, accumulated assets, gifts and inheritance . . . all of a sudden there’s a tangle of financial assets that must be divided. There are also tax issues, evaluating pension plans or business interests and decisions about your jointly-owned home. Alimony and child support may also now enter the picture.

A Certified Divorce Analyst (CDFA) can help.

At Hefren-Tillotson, our Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (CDFA), will assist you and your lawyer with understanding how the financial decisions you make today will impact your financial future. Our CDFA is certified through the Institute for Divorce Financial Analysts, which is the premier national organization dedicated to financial professionals in the divorce arena.

It is important to point out that a CDFA does not replace your attorney, instead works as part of the divorce team to ensure you make the right financial decisions today to achieve your financial goals post-divorce.

What does a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst Do?

• Determine the short and long-term effects of dividing property
• Identify tax issues
• Analyze pension and retirement plan issues
• Help divide a business interest
• Determine if you can afford the marital home or must seek a more affordable alternative
• Evaluate insurance needs (health, life, disability)
• Project estimated inflation rates and rates of return
• Collect financial and expense data
• Help you identify future financial goals, such as developing a budget, setting retirement objectives, and identifying proper asset allocation
• Provide your lawyer with the financial impact of a settlement to be used as litigation support

If you’re a current client, contact your Hefren-Tillotson advisor, and he or she will engage our CDFA to make sure your financial concerns are safeguarded.

If you are not a current Hefren-Tillotson client, feel free to contact us to schedule a meeting with our CDFA.

Protecting your legacy wealth with estate planning

Like many investors, providing your heirs with the legacy of your wealth is probably a top priority. We can help you develop estate plans that support your vision and beliefs about wealth distribution.

Our in-house financial experts will craft a MASTERPLAN^® specifically for you, by first listening carefully to how you view your wealth and what kind of legacy you want to leave for future generations.

We then organize your assets, minimize estate taxes for you or your heirs and streamline the estate distribution process. We’ll ensure that your estate plan keeps pace with changing law. And we’ll clearly communicate any recommendations for plan modifications in a timely manner.

It’s important to us that you have peace of mind, knowing that your plan is always up to date and aligned with your wishes and your values.

Strategic management of inheritance investments

While coming into an inheritance is often portrayed as a dream come true, the facts are often quite different. For many investors, the sudden arrival of a sizable lump-sum of funds can be overwhelming. It also may transport the recipient into new worlds of inheritance tax and legal responsibility.

We provide trusted, expert inheritance planning and guidance that will help you protect your inheritance, and put it to work for you.

The MASTERPLAN^® process will help you determine how your inheritance can best launch your financial planning efforts or how it can be integrated into existing savings plans.

Either way, our team of advisors – including financial and legal experts – can implement the strategies you need to make the most of your inheritance. After all, it’s your money now. Let us help you do something great with it.